my bones are shifting in my skin
by saradelovely
Summary: and i held you closer than anyone would ever get.


It begins with Finn. When he leaves her for his girlfriend again, Rachel shrugs her shoulders and wonders why she's so surprised; she wonders when she'll learn. She's not that type of girl, she doesn't put her heart through a blender on a weekly basis but that's exactly what she's come to do these days.

She thinks he's an ingrate but she would have to be blind not to notice, Puck's _hot _with a smirk that never quits.

She doesn't know how one thing led to another; this was maybe _probably_ always bound to happen, a fate written for them from the gods.

e_ven if she doesn't believe in fate, and epic love stories, she'll believe in this. _

She presses her thumb against his mouth, _don't tell_.

She ends up with him in his bed, no alcohol necessary; just straight lust and his mouth moving _down down down_.

He's surprised when he wakes up the next morning to an empty bed, the wind blowing through his window. He moves his hand to scratch the back of his neck, his mind trying to absorb the recent events that just transpired.

He never would have pictured Berry for a girl to leave in the middle of the night but well, here he is and she's _gone_.

s_he leaves before he can wake up and realize she's still there. she doesn't want to wake up and see the look in his eyes, the look wishing she was someone else but that's where she's wrong. he finds her in the hallway at school and kisses her, and when she looks at him, she realizes she's exactly who she wants to be when he's there._

This is what it becomes. It is a series of moments that they steal, moments that they grasp through their hands at school, at rehearsal and in the darkness of the night, inside his house, never hers. When it's over, when they've received their fill, she leaves. There are no words exchanged and in the privacy of each other, they're who they are, not who everyone else thinks they are.

There are suspicions but nobody would _dare_ ask to verify. Even he doesn't believe it sometimes.

Smoldering sex with a sixteen year old with no strings attached. He laughs. _Every_ guy's fantasy.

He still feels empty when she's gone.

s_he entered his life like she was meant to be there all along, he'll come to memorize the way she feels underneath his hands and later, later; he'll have learned her as easily as he's learned to have a good time._

"If you stay, I could make you breakfast."

_Fuck_. He's the _least_ domesticated person he knows but he's resorted to breakfast, a feeble attempt to get her to stay longer. She doesn't say anything, pulling up her knee socks.

"I can't."

"You can't or you won't?"

She looks at him sadly, the drifting of melancholy in her eyes. She hides her watery smile as gracefully as she can.

"We both know it's the same thing."

_one night he intertwines his hands with hers and looks at her in the eyes, she can feel the chills down to her spine. she wonders if anyone else will ever look at her the way he does. _

Puck drops his hands from her waist when the Glee kids filter in, Finn's eyes going the widest of them all. _Fucking_ Finn, Puck thinks. Puck has never been oblivious quite the way Finn is, he's seen the way Rachel looks at his best friend, wide eyed with adoration, _Finn hung the moon and the stars; _he can almost picture her saying. Even if those looks have vanished, tiny fragments inside his heart still cower in fear of those looks returning.

Finn catches her on her way out the door when the session is over, her legs moving quicker than her body can carry her.

"Rachel, we need to talk."

"I'm running late, please make this important."

"Are you sleeping with Puck? He's bad news."

She turns to look at him, and she can taste the lies on her taste buds. He is the boy that didn't want to stay, she thinks. He left time and again, _left_ without explanations and words; how carelessly he used her. Say all she could about Puck, he's never been less than honest with her. She weighs the benefits and negatives of telling him; her heart deciding she wants to keep Puck for herself for a little whole longer.

She looks him in the eyes when she hears him clearing his throat expectantly, still waiting for an answer, still waiting for an answer to a question that hangs between them.

"No."

She doesn't wait for an answer, turning on her heel and continuing to walk in the opposite direction.

_i_ _don't know what this is, there's no words for this, is there? i've always been one for words and sentences, flowery phrases of extras but i don't have anything to say, tell me what this is._

_ whatever you want, you can have whatever you want._ _his back arches and his hands run through her hair, his fingers falling through loose strands and she can feel herself trembling. later, she'll wonder if it was from his weight or the weight of his words._

"My dad is an alcoholic, he bailed on us when I was nine."

Her head is on the pillow, her hair snaked around like spiders smattering up vines. They've gone blow for blow several minutes earlier; there's so much anger inside his heart, the anger spilling over them like a tidal wave. He _took _and _took, _his hands clasped against her hip bones strong enough to leave a bruise and now she's here, his hand clenched in hers; his thumb circling her skin. She doesn't know why he's telling her this; she's never inquired into the status of his family, much less opened a discussion for the current events in his life but lately, lately all he does is _talk, _telling her things she's positive he's never informed anyone else of.

(She thought it would be simple and straightforward; but then it stops being about _sex_ and starts being something else, something she can't put her finger to the beat of the pulse on)

She turns her head to stare at him, his eyes directed at the ceiling, gazing emptily. She buries her head into his shoulder, her eyes are stinging, and she kicks a leg over his. She hold him in her hands, holding tightly until she's sure they're both clawing for oxygen.

"When I have kids, I don't want to be that dad. I don't want to mess up."

She can still feel his words whisper through, falling through the cracks of his tightly closed throat.

They don't say anything when he's done.

Later, after it's ceased to matter, she'll find out why he told her what he did.

w_ere you going to tell me?_

_ no, not if i could help it. i didn't want you to ever look at me with disappointment._

_ you're not, you're not, you could never. she'll chant over and over until the words ingrain within his mind._

_ what else is there for her to do, really? leave?_

Finn catches them again, and Puck leaves her with the responsibility of repairing the aftermath. He's not in the mood to see one of Finn's fists flying into his face again, much less eager to hear the sound of bone breaking.

"You lied to me."

"Excuse me?"

"I asked you, I _asked_ you if you're sleeping with him and you told me no, you told me no straight to my face. I thought I could trust you, especially after my best friend and my girlfriend lied to me. I thought I could rely on you, Rachel."

"Really? This is about trust now?"

He looks confused. "What else would it be?"

She laughs bitterly, her voice laced with disdain.

"I didn't lie to you, I only told you what you wanted to hear. Isn't this what our friendship has been about? Giving you what you want? You like me but you don't want to be with me, not _even_ after the stunt Quinn pulls. Don't act like you're doing me any favors by looking out for me."

He looks at her, something similar to pity lining the whites of his eyes.

"You know he's going to leave you, right? He's going to _fuck_ you, and leave you. Like he does with everyone else."

_he couldn't, it couldn't be about the sex. the way his head leans on top of hers, when his arms encircle her in the middle of the __night, the way he says stay, he says stay. love's an excuse to get hurt but he hasn't hurt her yet, he couldn't. he could. _

She moves to break up with him but her words doesn't match her head; she says something leaving them both wide eyed.

"Are you sleeping with someone else?"

Puck nods seriously; obviously the question is ridiculous. "A harem of tramps, obviously."

She nods at his bluntness. She doesn't know why she expected differently. Finn was evidently right, she misread the signs.

"Oh."

He rolls his eyes but finds himself stopping short when he sees something akin to sadness filter through her eyes, her eyes blinking furiously to avoid the tears.

"What the fuck, Berry? Get out of here."

"This isn't a game to me, and I'm offended."

She eye rolls. "It was a simple question, seeing as how we haven't discussed what _this_ is."

"This?"

"You _know_."

He enjoys watching her squirm.

"No, I don't."

"We're just sleeping together."

"No."

"No?"

"No."

He kisses her on the side of her forehead, his hands cupping her face.

"I have to get to football practice. Come find me when you have the answer."

_she wanders around the school after he's gone, her fingers falling across the lockers. she's an intelligent girl but apparently dense when it comes to affairs of the heart. when the sound of her heart overpowers her brain, she finds her way home. _

She wakes up with him the next morning, the first time.

He squints at her, the sun in his way.

"You weren't here when I fell asleep."

"Nope."

"And you didn't meet me after football practice yesterday either."

"Nope."

"But you're here now."

"Yes."

"We're in a relationship."

He kisses her head, and she smiles at the way the words tug at her heart.

"That's my girl."

_tell me what you're thinking._

_ i'm not thinking anything. the noise in my head has crawled to a stop._

_ tell me anyway._

_ why?_

_ because i'm thinking of you, because i'm thinking i love you._

AN: As always, reviews are love. I tried to make this happy, I did. It's either a hit or miss. (If you have any constructive criticism, let me know. Maybe I update too much?)


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